1903 Cleveland Roadster project

[Sloth]

After some adjusting of the position of the engine, at last, both large and small sprocket line up. So I can be sure that the chain is keeping its position on both. Today, I looked for the necessary tools and part for pouring the engine bearings. Also inspected the head, the valve seats are not bad. But the valves and valve guides are very worn. The inlet valve is automatic (atmospheric), small and light. Head and stem are separate parts, the head is screwed on the stem. When opened by the vacuum of the engine, the valve spring is just capable to get the valve closed again . Timing of this engine will be an interesting experience I guess.

Regards,

Harm

Edited October 4, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[JV Puleo]

Sloth...you have probably already thought of this but I'd make a new intake valve. Those two-piece valves, which were very common, are a serious potential hazard. I know of at least one case where the valve broke and the piston drove it through the cylinder wall. In my own case, my first brass car had a broken valves but fortunately the pieces landed in the sump. The heads are cast iron which could stand the combustion temperature much better than any of the steels available at the time but this is a case where It's foolhardy to copy the original.

 

 

[JustDave]

A lot of air compressors have that 2 piece valve and they break all the time

[Mike Macartney]

11 hours ago, JV Puleo said:

Sloth...you have probably already thought of this but I'd make a new intake valve.

 

I can't agree more. The spring for the inlet valve needs to be weak enough to let the valve come off its seat when you hold the inlet valve 'holder' in your hand and shake it to a sudden stop. You should hear the 'click' as the valve closes on its seat. I time the ignition on the Crestmobile at TDC. The ignition timing advance has far more affect than any of the carburettor levers!

 

I am very pleased to say that I have found somebody in our village who has an affinity with old machinery, although his experience is mainly with steam powered engines. I last used the Crestmobile at least two years ago. At the time it needed the 'clutches' adjusting on the transmission as it would not climb the slope into the garage, either forwards or backwards. Last spring when I attempted to do the adjustments I got under the Crestmobile and did not have any energy left to do anything, I left it until I felt better, unfortunately I got worse.

 

 

All sorted and back from a trial run. Richard found the problem with the reverse gear. It was a control rod that was bending when the reverse pedal was being used. He also had to clean out the fuel tank, carb and check and adjust the timing to get the engine started. It was very strange 'watching' the work being carried out, rather than actually doing the work. The Crestmobile is now running beautifully and I really enjoyed the ride around the village. Richard is going to come and take me out for a run in the Crestmobile again before Bonhams come to collect the Crestmobile to sell in their Pre London to Brighton auction which is at the end of October. 

 

 

[JV Puleo]

That's great Mike...

[Sloth]

Hello Mike, that is a very nice picture. Anna and I like the car very much. I am happy to learn that the car now runs well (and brakes well 😉). In "normal" times Anna and I would travel to London to attend the sale at Bonhams (hoped to see the car in person) and enjoy the rally as spectators. But not this year.

 

Gentlemen, I read your comment about about the two piece valves and took this very serious. Making valves would not be much of a problem. But as I used to have a big box with new valves somewhere, I raised this morning early and started searching the box with the valves. After one hour found it (well Anna found it, she walked in and pointed to a box in right front of me 🤬 with clearly written "VALVES" on it). No never saw it, this happens to me again and again, feel a bit dumb now. Started measuring some valves, and lo and behold, Ford model A valves are perfect. Same stem diameter, when I cut the mushroomed end off they have the same overall length and the same valve diameter. As they are modern Rust Free valves, they would not cause a problem for a very long time. Well that makes short work of the valve problem. What is left is cutting a thread on the exhaust valve for the adjustable spring keeper (the exhaust valve clearance can be adjusted...).  Further making a decent spring keeper for the inlet valve. Weighing the old and the new valves, surprised me. The old valves are 3.42 ounces (97 grams) and 3.28 ounces (93 grams), the Ford valves (after cutting off the mushroom end) are 3.42 ounces (97 grams). Inspecting the head further, I saw that a previous owner put in a valve seat insert at the exhaust side. I don't know what to think about it, as it appears the seat was slightly out of wack (one side was a slightly higher than the opposite side). I think they machined the recess not at 90 degrees but 88 or something. I don't dare to remove the insert, I have no idea if the seat is pressed or screwed in... So I took my Neway seat cutter set and used the very hard new cutter inserts, I bought them several years ago (and never used them). Well they cut as a sharp knife through butter, just a few cuttings and the valve seated very nice. The inlet side valve seated perfect no cutting here.

 

Head with inlet valve left and exhaust right

 

Ye Olde Valves (would be a nice name for a Pub...)

 

Head with valve seat insert on the right, the black ridge shows the "high" side

 

Neway valve cutter set

 

I made some pictures of the head. I have never seen in my life, a head with an valve "chamber" and galley, as this one has. I am very curious what reason the designer of the head came up with, to design it as it is. The spark plug is located above the exhaust valve, so it will take some time for the ignition to reach the cylinder. I guess this engine needs a lot of advanced ignition, to let anything happen in the cylinder at all. Years ago Roger Weiss warned me "Harm, it is not much of a road car", we will see.... Further I found two letter O and R on the head, I have not the slightest idea what they mean... maybe the Manufacturers initials?

 

 

 

 

 

Spark plug is located on the left side (into a small cylinder head - head).  Ignition and explosion going through the small galley into the cylinder (will take ages, I guess).

 

I must say, I enjoy myself immensely, learning a lot about the early stages of engine and car development. To me it seems that, at that time, European and American car development, where different on a lot of characteristics. In Europe, by 1902, slow running horizontal engines where long gone, in favor of the high revving vertical engines.

Regards,

Harm

 

Edited September 7, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Gary_Ash]

We can calculate the flame speed from some simple equations:

where

{ G(n,m,a)=int _{0}^{\infty }y^{n}(y+a)^{m}\ dy}

 

😄 Yes, these really are some equations for computing flame speed, though none of us care to use them.

My best guess from quickly Googling some flame speed numbers for spark-ignition engines on gasoline is about 10 meters/second, depends on pressure in the combustion chamber and lots of other things.  At 1000 rpm, the ignition/expansion stroke would take about 15 milliseconds, so let's say we allow 5 milliseconds for the ignition flame to do its work.   So, the flame could travel about 5 cm or 2 inches in that time but it would continue to travel until all the fuel/air mixture is burned.  At least it computes to the right order of magnitude, and we know that the engine does run.  One of my high school teachers hammered into us that you have to look at the answers from your slide rule to see if it made any sense - does an elephant weigh about 8 lbs, 8,000 lbs, or 8,000,000 lbs?  Sounds like your engine can work at lower speeds but it's not going to run at high speeds, as we already know.   What is amazing is how fast engine technology improved in the early 1900s.  

[JV Puleo]

Gary...those equations might be simple to you but they make my head spin!

 

[EDIT] I wish I had an aptitude for complicated math. It was always my weakest subject which is odd because math is pure logic and I'm good at working with logical problems. I suspect I never had a really good teacher and I know I had a few real slugs...but that is another story and way off topic.

Edited September 6, 2020 by JV Puleo (see edit history)

[Sloth]

43 minutes ago, Gary_Ash said:

We can calculate the flame speed from some simple equations:

where

{ G(n,m,a)=int _{0}^{\infty }y^{n}(y+a)^{m}\ dy}

 

😄 Yes, these really are some equations for computing flame speed, though none of us care to use them.

My best guess from quickly Googling some flame speed numbers for spark-ignition engines on gasoline is about 10 meters/second, depends on pressure in the combustion chamber and lots of other things.  At 1000 rpm, the ignition/expansion stroke would take about 15 milliseconds, so let's say we allow 5 milliseconds for the ignition flame to do its work.   So, the flame could travel about 5 cm or 2 inches in that time but it would continue to travel until all the fuel/air mixture is burned.  At least it computes to the right order of magnitude, and we know that the engine does run.  One of my high school teachers hammered into us that you have to look at the answers from your slide rule to see if it made any sense - does an elephant weigh about 8 lbs, 8,000 lbs, or 8,000,000 lbs?  Sounds like your engine can work at lower speeds but it's not going to run at high speeds, as we already know.   What is amazing is how fast engine technology improved in the early 1900s.  

Hello Gary,

Thank you for your answer. Ah yes, some simple equations🙄. Looking at them and remembering struggling at technical college with integral and differential calculus, I think, it is better  just get the engine running and do some experimenting what settings are needed to have it run nicely. That would be the shortest way to happiness and a good night sleep 😄.  Calculating and interpretation of the results  would be nearly impossible for me, as I have no reference background (no experience at all with this kind of engines), being just a simple electronics engineer/designer by profession. And yes your school teacher was quite right. When the first computers became available at my department, a lot of engineers and scientists believed  the computed answers. They learned the hard way and very rapidly, to evaluate the computed answers. Computer: ambiguous or incorrect input data = useless answer out (we called this the shit in = shit out principle). I felt this as a problem with new young colleague at my department, just not enough  practical experience to evaluate the answers for validity, but enough grumpy old engineers and scientists around to show them the real world.... 😆.

Regards,

Harm

[Gary_Ash]

So what do you expect the rpm range of your engine will be?  If the maximum rpm's are much less than 1000, then we can understand how the engine can actually run with the plugs so far away.  Maybe not efficiently compared to a modern engine, but it did seem to work on those old slow-sped engines.

 

The equations are just a tease.  Nobody working on old cars should pay much attention to calculating things out except to understand, just for fun,  how things work.  

[edinmass]

Gary.....a slide rule......I’m 55 and have only seen them used by OLD guys in my teens........😝

[Gary_Ash]

Yes, Ed, I am one of those OLD guys, have 21 years on you.  I still have my Keuffel & Esser Log Log Duplex Decitrig slide rule from high school as well as my grandfather's Vega book of 10-place log tables.  Can you multiply and divide using a log table book?  I'll bet that Harm can and a few other guys who read here.

 

K&E log log duplex decitrig slide rule can multiply, divide, give sines, tangents, logarithms, etc.  Works as fast as a calculator, but only 3-digit accuracy.

You do have to figure out where to put the decimal point.

 

A page from the 1911 edition of Georg's Freiherrn von Vega "Logarithmisch-Trigonometrisches Handbuch".  It was bought by 

my grandfather in May, 1916, used by him as a mining engineer, used by my father in college, and used by me in college.

With a book like this, you can get 8-10 place accuracy, e.g. the circumference of the earth to within an inch.

Edited September 6, 2020 by Gary_Ash (see edit history)

[alsfarms]

Ed,  It sounds like to you need to join the "Slide Rule" club.  Just for the experience in learning how one works.  In High School to took most of my tests with the venerable slide ruler until Texas Instrument came out with an affordable portable calculator that we could carry with us.   🙂  I have a Chemical Engineer son, from the current working generation, who actually knows how to run a slide rule! 

Al

[edinmass]

I think the slide rule is a great tool, I last saw one used 15 years ago.....a gear cutter making me a worm gear sat down at his desk and in fifteen minutes figured everything out. He warned us not to interrupt him while he was making his calculations. The worm that couldn’t be made was made......correctly the first time. Old school smart........I was very impressed. Sadly, the engineer is gone now.

[Sloth]

9 hours ago, Gary_Ash said:

So what do you expect the rpm range of your engine will be?  If the maximum rpm's are much less than 1000, then we can understand how the engine can actually run with the plugs so far away.  Maybe not efficiently compared to a modern engine, but it did seem to work on those old slow-sped engines.

 

The equations are just a tease.  Nobody working on old cars should pay much attention to calculating things out except to understand, just for fun,  how things work.  

Hello Gary,

I guess 500 - 600 RPM max. I took 500 RPM to calculate the teeth on the sprockets, given a max speed of 25 miles / hour on a flat road.

Regards,

Harm

[Mike Macartney]

17 hours ago, Sloth said:

No never saw it, this happens to me again and again

 

Welcome to the 'club' - I am please to hear I am not alone!🙂

 

10 hours ago, Gary_Ash said:

The equations are just a tease.

 

Gary, when I read your post with the 'formula' I had to look at the date to see if it was 1st April.

[Sloth]

Today, I started very early (7:30 o'clock, not bad for a Sunday 😄). The plan was to paint all motor and carburetor parts with epoxy primer. As we had very nice weather (a bit windy, but in the right direction) I could spay the parts outside. It took quite some preparation time, but I am satisfied with the result. Tomorrow I hope to put some black paint on. Weather forecast is quite good, no wind at all and a temperature  of 75 F (25 C), perfect for 2K painting.

 

The result of a days work.

 

Regards,

Harm

 

Edited September 13, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Terry Harper]

Hello Harm,

 

In regards to the cylinder head and the "gallery" for the valves. I have seen a number of examples of this. One that comes to mind is a 3 hp Launch engine designed by E.W. Roberts in 1901. He didn't manufacture this particular engine but he did provide a neat booklet with drawings and instructions on how make your own version.

 

The engine had a detachable head and the valves and ignitor where in a separate water cooled "valve box" bolted to the side of the cylinder block. All very interesting. 

 

Using the book my students created all the 3D models and a full set of shop drawings for the engine. Mechanical engineering students at MIT planned to use our drawings and models to build a working prototype as a capstone project. Being a small high school program located way up in the hinterlands, we were pretty excited about working with MIT. Unfortunately, once they got into it they decided it was a more complex project than they wanted to do. I found it a bit ironic that the original design was developed as a DIY project!

 

Fascinating bits of engineering and amazing how fast the technology evolved!

 

In the rendering below you can see the automatic inlet valve at the top as well as the water pump which is 

run via an eccentric. You can also see the trip mechanism for the ignitor which runs off the water pump plunger rod.

 

Here you can see the exhaust valve which also runs off of an eccentric.

 

 

Robert's book is available as a reprint.

 

 

Robert's drawings for The "Valve Box". Its interesting that every dimension is in fractions.

Hard to get use too in a world that's measured by three or more decimal places!

 

[Luv2Wrench]

On 9/6/2020 at 7:23 PM, Gary_Ash said:

Yes, Ed, I am one of those OLD guys, have 21 years on you.  I still have my Keuffel & Esser Log Log Duplex Decitrig slide rule from high school as well as my grandfather's Vega book of 10-place log tables.  Can you multiply and divide using a log table book?  I'll bet that Harm can and a few other guys who read here.

 

K&E log log duplex decitrig slide rule can multiply, divide, give sines, tangents, logarithms, etc.  Works as fast as a calculator, but only 3-digit accuracy.

You do have to figure out where to put the decimal point.

 

A page from the 1911 edition of Georg's Freiherrn von Vega "Logarithmisch-Trigonometrisches Handbuch".  It was bought by 

my grandfather in May, 1916, used by him as a mining engineer, used by my father in college, and used by me in college.

With a book like this, you can get 8-10 place accuracy, e.g. the circumference of the earth to within an inch.

 

You don't need trig to measure the earth because it isn't a circumference... it is flat.  Take a 25' tape measure, find one edge, measure out 25', retract tape and repeat.  When you get to other edge you will know the length of the earth.   If you do this, please take pictures at each edge and post.

 

Also, I might add, that "flame speed" is measured in different units than suggested by some wizards in this thread.  It is measure as "fast" "really fast" and "#*!!#&* fast". 

 

Hope this clears up some of the confusion.

 

Edited September 13, 2020 by Luv2Wrench (see edit history)

[JV Puleo]

On 9/6/2020 at 7:36 PM, alsfarms said:

Ed,  It sounds like to you need to join the "Slide Rule" club.  Just for the experience in learning how one works.  In High School to took most of my tests with the venerable slide ruler until Texas Instrument came out with an affordable portable calculator that we could carry with us.   🙂  I have a Chemical Engineer son, from the current working generation, who actually knows how to run a slide rule! 

Al

 

Slide rules were much in evidence when I was in High School and I remember buying a fairly good one (I've always preferred good tools). I never mastered it and today I don't even know what happened to it though I probably still have it somewhere. The fact is, there are some of us for whom solving mathematical problems just isn't intuitive. They have always been a chore but at least I was fairly good with geometry which, in machine work, has proven to be very useful. I'd love to be able to do the type of calculations Gary describes but at this point I may be too old and not have the time to learn.

[Sloth]

On 9/13/2020 at 5:59 PM, Terry Harper said:

Hello Harm,

 

In regards to the cylinder head and the "gallery" for the valves. I have seen a number of examples of this. One that comes to mind is a 3 hp Launch engine designed by E.W. Roberts in 1901. He didn't manufacture this particular engine but he did provide a neat booklet with drawings and instructions on how make your own version.

 

The engine had a detachable head and the valves and ignitor where in a separate water cooled "valve box" bolted to the side of the cylinder block. All very interesting. 

 

Using the book my students created all the 3D models and a full set of shop drawings for the engine. Mechanical engineering students at MIT planned to use our drawings and models to build a working prototype as a capstone project. Being a small high school program located way up in the hinterlands, we were pretty excited about working with MIT. Unfortunately, once they got into it they decided it was a more complex project than they wanted to do. I found it a bit ironic that the original design was developed as a DIY project!

 

Fascinating bits of engineering and amazing how fast the technology evolved!

 

In the rendering below you can see the automatic inlet valve at the top as well as the water pump which is 

run via an eccentric. You can also see the trip mechanism for the ignitor which runs off the water pump plunger rod.

 

Here you can see the exhaust valve which also runs off of an eccentric.

 

 

Robert's book is available as a reprint.

 

 

Robert's drawings for The "Valve Box". Its interesting that every dimension is in fractions.

Hard to get use too in a world that's measured by three or more decimal places!

 

Hello Terry,

For me, this would be a tempting project. But having already too many projects underhand, I guess my better half would object very strongly 😉. But building this engine has all the challenges I like: making models for casting, machine work (a lot of it I think), and so on. Thank you for your extensive reaction.

Regards,

Harm

[Sloth]

Today, I painted the engine parts (black). The temperature was A bit on the high side, 90 F (32 C) The paint ( MIPA, Poly Urethane) did not flow well, dried nearly immediately, found a new unopened tin of retarder (due date 2017.... 🙄). That did the trick, used it during the last spray turn.

 

Engine parts, the two lids on the right look bad. But in reality they are just nice and shiny.  Has it something to do with the Iphone camera??

 

Now its time to think about making bearing shells and poring Babbitt. Must not forget to do this also for the bearing block, located at the end of the crankshaft. This bearing block is bolted at the chassis, it supports the very long and slender crankshaft. As the chassis is not very stiff, I wonder what happens when the chassis flexes, this, for instance because of driving through a pothole or something like that.

 

Regards,

Harm

 

PS: I am still capable to use my slide rule😁, found it back, including the book with all the log, anti-log, sine, tang, and so on tables. First two years at technical college its use was mandatory. At the fourth year the Texas Instruments SR-51 A was allowed during the exams, but not HP as those calculators where more or less programmable. I think I must have it lying around some where (ANN would you ........😉).

Edited September 14, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Sloth]

Today, we had a nice and warm day, so I could do some painting work outside. I painted the lower body and seat with West System epoxy. Weather forecast for the coming week is good, so I will sanding the body and hope to put on some thin layer of spray filler.

 

Seat

 

Lower body

 

Regards,

Harm

Edited September 17, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Luv2Wrench]

Wonderful work as always.  This is going to be a beautiful car!!

 

When we manage to collapse the United States, can I live with you guys?

[Laughing Coyote]

2 hours ago, Luv2Wrench said:

When we manage to collapse the United States, can I live with you guys?

Ditto. I would love to go to New Zealand too.

[Sloth]

3 hours ago, Luv2Wrench said:

Wonderful work as always.  This is going to be a beautiful car!!

 

When we manage to collapse the United States, can I live with you guys?

Hello Jeff

Thank you for your kind words. Sure you can live with us, no problem. But please take your beautiful cars with you 😏. In my neck of the woods, more brass cars restored by its owners would do us a lot of good (at least me..... 😄). Very few people around me are restoring brass cars... so very few restorers to talk with.

Regards,

Harm

 

PS

Don't forget your machines, I love your Hendey 😏!  I think you will need some electronic frequency converters (our power supply standard: 230V or 400V 3 phase 50Hz).

Edited September 20, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Mike Macartney]

17 hours ago, Luv2Wrench said:

When we manage to collapse the United States, can I live with you guys?

 

Sounds if we may have started a restoration commune? It looks if you have plenty of room Harm! 😉

[Sloth]

2 hours ago, Mike Macartney said:

 

Sounds if we may have started a restoration commune? It looks if you have plenty of room Harm! 😉

Hello Mike,

Sounds good to me, a tribe of "Grumpy old car and machine restorers"?

Well, on a serious note, a lot of farmers in my neighborhood are ending farming. Most of them own very large stables. Their farms are unsaleable  (too large) and too many of them. But for one who needs a large hobby shop its ideal, although I must admit, the cost of maintenance would be high (how do I know...😅). Nowadays, getting rid of these large agricultural buildings proved a real problem for the (ex)farmers. Selling the land, no problem, selling the farm with the buildings, impossible!

Regards,

Harm

[Mike Macartney]

2 minutes ago, Sloth said:

Nowadays, getting rid of these large agricultural buildings proved a real problem for the (ex)farmers.

 

Hello Harm,

In our area of North Norfolk, being near the coast, a lot of the old farm buildings, being of built in brick and flint, are converted into holiday homes. Our barn was built in 1756 and we bought it off the farmer, who had expanded and bought most of the small farms that surround us. We converted it to a house and workshop back in the 1990's. We have about half an acre of garden which is a bit of a problem looking after now we are becoming old and grumpy!

Best regards

Mike

[Sloth]

Warning: not car related content. 😄

 

Dear gentlemen,

Last days I got a bit distracted. During an early thunder storm (4 month ago), we heard some serious creaking of the wooden farm frame. After an inspection, we found one of the joints of the heavy wooden roof cross beams gave way a bit. At a closer look, not much of the joint was left (bad quality Oak, just only 200 years old.... 😉) . Well, we needed to do something rather quick. So I tried to order new oak beams. Called several lumber yards and saw mills. No Oak beams available, try again in December... Asking what was available and strong enough for the task, I was advised to use Douglas. OK, I need 4 beams 10" x 10" 10 feet long. Yes, we have that, kiln dried, dimensional correct, and no warping,sounds good. OK, we will send you an email, when we deliver your order. And then the Corona virus spoiled the party.... we had to wait at least two months. Shit happens, so we waited, but at last, some weeks ago the beams where delivered, nice and dry. As autumn is approaching, Anna and I decided, we should replace the beams as soon as possible. So we started last Saturday, removing a lot of valuable things (junk that is...). Yesterday I started, making the joints in the new beams. Sawing and chiseling out some joints, o boy, that wood is dense and hard. Today, bad weather, a lot of rain. Will continue tomorrow.

Pictures of the 'nearly gone' joint, the long 'sleeper beam' which runs from the front to the end of the farm stable, is a bit twisted. Further, during the years, it moved a bit to the end of the rotten cross beam  😨.

 

Detail picture of the disappearing joint. With the end of the sleeper beam clearly at the end of the cross beam.

 

New beams with some joint preparation done.

 

Living 'with' an old farm house is really nice, no doubt about it. But there are always small and not so small maintenance jobs. This is one of them, luckily most of the jobs are small and can be left till nice weather arrived again. But not this one, so I expect the next few weeks no Cleveland progress 😢.

Regards,

Harm

[Mike Macartney]

Still not car related, apart from the guy who sat underneath this oak beam, was selling classic BMW parts!

 

He complained that he thought the roof was going to collapse on him!

 

 

Not having the woodwork experience, I jacked the beam up, welded up some 1/4" plate and bolted the plate to the beam.

 

Harm, I think your repairs are better and more suitable.

 

Mike

[Sloth]

3 hours ago, Mike Macartney said:

Still not car related, apart from the guy who sat underneath this oak beam, was selling classic BMW parts!

 

He complained that he thought the roof was going to collapse on him!

 

 

Not having the woodwork experience, I jacked the beam up, welded up some 1/4" plate and bolted the plate to the beam.

 

Harm, I think your repairs are better and more suitable.

 

Mike

Hello Mike,

The beam strengthening looks well done, and sound.  I expect that the beams are much larger than can be seen.

But you should tell to the BMW parts selling person, that the incandescent light is way too heavy 😉 . I guess that is the root course of the beams to sag. 

Regards,

Harm

[alsfarms]

Hello Harm and others.  Now that the roof is repaired and back in good order...what is on with yoru old cars in general and specifically the Cleveland? 

Regards,

Al

[Sloth]

On 10/13/2020 at 3:47 PM, alsfarms said:

Hello Harm and others.  Now that the roof is repaired and back in good order...what is on with yoru old cars in general and specifically the Cleveland? 

Regards,

Al

Hello Al,

After replacing the bad part of the frame, I decided to replace the whole frame. And so it became a lot more work than foreseen. I finish it tomorrow, I am to old to wrestle with 300 Lbs wooden beams😓 .

Furthermore, we started renovating the second floor. We never thought about doing it.  Working together on this job, is really satisfying 🥰. But as we are now in a partial lock down, due to the rapid increasing spread of Covid-19  infections, our social life is very restricted. Well, to be honest, no social life anymore  to speak about. Yesterday evening, our prime minister announced a package of firm measures, to get a grip on the spread of infections. We are now a few weeks into the second wave and it really hurts. But as shit happens, we stay at home and hope to stay healthy.

 

Right side of frame (left side is identical)

 

Did not much work on the Cleveland. Planned coming weekend to start with the bearings of the Cleveland engine. Designed a line boring tool for it. Ordered some steel and bronze bushings. My other old cars are sitting unused, not a single outing. Feel a bit sad about it, but Anna and I are very grateful being healthy and health is what counts.

Regards,

Harm

 

Edited October 15, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Jeff Perkins / Mn]

You are staying safe and staying healthy AND entertaining many of us who are finding your barn project very interesting. Thank you for your updates. Very best of wishes for you and Anna and........don’t work tooooo hard!!😀

[Sloth]

Hello Jeff,

Thank you for the good wishes. The frame is completed and ready now. So tomorrow back to the shop and the Cleveland engine, for making a mock-up of the line boring tool (wood again..). Anna and I limit the time we will spend on the renovation to two days a week. Progress will be slow but we are not in a hurry.

Regards,

Harm

Edited October 15, 2020 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Sloth]

An oily affair.

This morning I had planned to turn the two bushings for the main bearing shells of the Cleveland engine. Saturday and yesterday I cleaned the lathe and put oil into all 4 of the gear boxes and the ways, as is described in the TOS MAS 18S lathe manual. All nice and done on Saturday and yesterday. This morning at 7:30 hr, off to the shop, to make it a long and useful day. Well not so, I was greeted by a large puddle of oil on the floor around the lathe 😠. First thought, I overfilled the main gearbox. But after some investigation, I saw that some  oil leaked behind the drive pulley. Conclusion: the oil seal  of the main drive axle was gone. But the reason why it started leaking just now, is a mystery to me. First thing to do, to scoop all the oil into a container. I scooped about 1.5 gallon of oil, used oil absorbent material on the remaining oil (worked very well). After that, I lifted the gear box a bit (which is situated into the large foot under the head-stock and is really heavy). The reason for this is, I wanted to have some room for removing the large flat belt and the drive pulley. This lathe is indirect driven by a 4 inch wide leather flat belt, the head stock pulley runs in separate bearings  independent of the spindle. This ensures that no vibrations of the motor and gearbox are transmitted to the spindle.  Removing the gearbox pulley was easy, not so the two bearings and oil seal. Took me several hours to get them off. One bearing is shot, the other is nice and clean. The oil seal had seen better days. Just to be sure, this evening I ordered 2 bearings and an oil seal. I hope to receive them Wednesday.

Scheme of the lathe drive, the blue arrow points to the pulley and bearings.

 

Gearbox with half inch oil puddle below, drive pulley on the right.

 

An oily foot, left oil pump supplying the head stock with oil, right the 6HP drive motor. (No problem with heavy cuts 😁)

 

A lot of oil absorbent material was needed to remove the remaining oil

 

Regards,

Harm

Edited February 12, 2021 by Sloth (see edit history)

[Mike Macartney]

Yet another job you could have done without!

[Luv2Wrench]

6HP... definitely a little envious of that.  I could break a lot of tooling with 6HP.  

 

[Sloth]

On 10/21/2020 at 3:06 PM, Luv2Wrench said:

6HP... definitely a little envious of that.  I could break a lot of tooling with 6HP.  

 

Hello Jeff, so did I 😁, now I am used to the HP and treat it with respect.  Clamping the tools and work piece into the chuck very tight is of utmost importance.  I use F type collets for heavy cuts. 5C collets are just to light for heavy work.

Regards,

Harm